\ 


4-V 


TOILERS’  TRACTS. 


JULY  4, 


1887, 


TVo.  1. 


PEOPLE’S  RIGHT 


WEALTH, 


REDUCED  TO  P  AND  C^ 


By  EDWARD  GORDON  CLARK, 


Author  of  “Man’s  Birthright:  or,  The  Higher  Law  of  Property”;  “The  People’s  Share 
in  Wealth”  (Contribution  to  “The  North  American  Review”);  “The  Mistake 
of  Henry  George’s  Land  Tax”  (N.  A.  R.) ;  “  Scientific  Taxation” 

(N.  A.  R,),  etc.,  etc. 


COPYRIGHT. 
ALL  RIGHTS 
RESERVED. 


MONOGRAPH  PUBLISHER, 

18  WASHINGTON  PLACE, 

NEW  YORK  CITY. 


PRICE, 

10 

CENTS. 


1 


To  Circulate  1,000,000  Copies  of  this  Tract  will  be  the  end  of  Socialism,  the  end  of  Communism,  the  end  of  Anirchism. 


THE  PEOPLE’S  RIGHT  IN  WEALTH, 

REDUCED  TO  DOLLARS  AND  CENTS. 


Modern  Freedom,  hungry,  ragged,  and  down  at  the  heel,  has  got  sick  of  herself.  She  has 
found  that  sovereignty  without  ownership  is  a  fraud.  The  expropriated — the  wretch  divorced  from 
capital,  and  to  whom  his  country  does  not  guarantee  honest  labor  with  fair  returns  for  it — is  a  slave. 
Special  black  slavery  has  been  abolished  in  America.  General  white  slavery  has  taken  its  place.  A 
thousand  monopolies  are  our  new  masters  ;  ten  thousand  politicians  are  their  overseers  ;  “  we,  the 
people,”  are  their  gangs  of  bondmen.  I  purpose  to  point  out  a  few  of  the  monopolies  which  have 
reduced  us  to  this  latest  form  of  slavery.  I  purpose,  then,  to  show  the  way — the  one  best  way — 
to  break  our  bonds  and  right  our  wrongs. 

It  makes  little  difference  just  where  we  begin.  Here  are  five  monopolies  that  have  kidnapped 
the  Government  of  the  United  States,  and  are  holding  it  to  service  as  their  chief  clerk  : 

Land  Monopoly, 

Currency  Monopoly, 

Tariff  Monopoly, 

Taxation  Monopoly, 

Transportation  Monopoly. 

Let  us  glance  at  the  first — 

Land  Monopoly. 

Since  the  United  States  became  a  nation,  the  people  have  owned  nine  hundred  millions  of  acres 
of  available  public  land.  Nominal  settlers  have  had  one-third  of  it.  A  hundred  and  sixty-one  mill¬ 
ion  acres  have  been  turned  over  to  the  States.  Sixty-seven  millions  have  gone  for  bounties,  water¬ 
ways  and  highways.  About  a  hundred  millions  are  left  unclaimed.  The  “railway  kings”  have 
“  gobbled  ”  the  rest  through  corrupt  legislation.  While  the  people  were  giving  half  a  million  lives 
to  save  the  nation,  these  “railway  kings”  appropriated,  through  their  partners  and  footmen  in  Con¬ 
gress,  twice  as  much  of  the  people’s  heritage  as  the  whole  territory  of  New  England.  While  Ameri¬ 
can  soldiers  were  dying  in  corps  to  preserve  eleven  States  to  the  Union,  American  monopolists 
were  taking  away  from  the  soldiers’  orphans  enough  territory  for  twelve  new  States.  These  sol¬ 
diers’  orphans  are  now  the  tenant-farmers  of  those  robbers’  heirs  and  assigns  ;  and  the  United  States 
contains  a  quarter  of  a  million  more  of  such  tenant  farmers  than  “  poor  old  Ireland.”  In  fact,  we 
have  as  much  ground  as  the  whole  of  Ireland  in  the  hands  of  twenty-nine  alien,  absentee  landlords. 
So  much  for  land  monopoly.* 

Now  look  at  the 

Currency  Monopoly. 

A  few  years  ago  a  new  party  sprang  up  among  us,  called  the  “  Greenback  Party.”  It  never 
amounted  to  much,  in  the  sense  of  electing  constables,  presidents,  and  such  things.  It  was  simply 
a  protest  against  one  of  the  most  gigantic  swindles  of  the  modern  world.  By  that  swindle,  the 
money -monopolists  of  America  and  Europe — what  Thaddeus  Stevens  called  the  “  bullion  mon¬ 
gers” — cheated  the  people  of  the  United  States  out  of  five  thousand  millions  of  dollars  in  the 
twenty  years  following  1861.  This  monopoly  was  procured  by  controlling  the  Senate,  and  seducing 
that  body  into  framing  the  legal  tender  act  of  a  great  nation  in  the  small,  single  interest  of  a  Wall- 
Street  coin-pot.  The  Coin-Pot  used  the  Senate  to  create  government  notes  convertible  at  their  face 


*  An  excellent  statistical  summary  of  “America’s  Land  Question  ”  can  be  found  in  the  “  North  American 
Review  ”  for  February,  1886,  in  an  article  by  A.  J.  Desmond. 


2 


THE  PEOPLE’S  RIGHT  IN  WEALTH, 

in  soldiers’  blood  and  bones,  but  expressly  inconvertible  at  the  same  value  in  the  percentages  of 
Shylock — the  interest  on  the  public  debt.  It  was  done  against  an  overwhelming  majority  of  the 
ablest  and  most  honest  House  of  Representatives  that  ever  sat  in  Washington.  Stevens,  “  the  great 
commoner,”  cried  over  it  like  a  child.  Spaulding — then  Chairman  of  the  sub-Committee  of  Ways 
and  Means,  since  President  of  the  National  Banking  Association — exposed  the  plot,  and  said 
it  would  “  double  the  national  debt.”  It  did  not— quite.  In  1865  the  debt  stood  at  twenty-eight 
hundred  and  eight  millions.  A  thousand  millions  of  it  was  sheer  inflation — water  injected  by  the 
coin-pot  conspiracy.  The  rest  was  a  tolerably  honest  obligation.  But  the  thousand  millions  has 
since  been  eating  interest,  and  the  inflation  soon  led  to  Hugh  McCulloch  and  his  murderous  con¬ 
traction— another  deal  in  the  sole  interest  of  the  coin-pot— by  which  he  wrecked  all  commercial 
values,  until  at  last  Congress  interfered,  and  choked  off  the  fiscal  traitor  to  his  country.  The  blood- 
money  of  the  currency -thugs,  reckoning  for  a  quarter  of  a  century,  has  been  estimated,  by  careful 
authorities,  as  high  as  seven  billions  of  dollars,  or  an  amount  equal  to  about  one-eighth  of  the  entire 
capital  of  the  country  to-day.  Other  estimates  have  been  lower,  and  some  higher.  But  a  billion 
or  two  is  of  no  consequence  where  the  robbery  has  been  so  nearly  incalculable. 

The  Tariff  Monopoly, 

in  its  fundamental  character,  is  a  confidence-game,  played  against  the  poor,  that  the  rich  may 
avoid  direct  taxation.  Our  fathers — a  few  of  whom  were  great  men — instituted  “  a  tariff  for  revenue.” 
They  knew  it  was  unjust,  but  they  did  it  as  they  instituted  slavery,  because  they  had  to  compro¬ 
mise  with  greed  and  littleness.  Then  came  the  pressure  to  “  encourage  infant  industries  ” — which 
had  already  started  without  encouragement.  The  brassy  giant  “protection,”  followed  the  babe 
“encouragement.”  Now  we  have  a  tariff  so  utterly  rotten  that  the  surplus  has  become  a  dead 
white  elephant,  and  party  scavengers  wonder  how  they  can  cart  it  away.* 

There  is  no  mystery  about  a  tariff.  The  trade  of  a  nation  is  like  the  trade  of  a  peanut-stand. 
To  get  all  the  wealth  you  can,  for  what  wealth  you  give,  is  the  business  of  both.  But  to  give  all 
the  corn  and  cotton  we  can  hand  out,  for  as  little  to  eat  and  wear  as  we  can  take  in,  is  A  merican 
“  business,”  under  the  tariff.  Buy  dear  and  sell  cheap  :  so  you  shall  have  prosperity !  In  the  inter¬ 
est  of  the  tariff  monopolists,  we  now  subsidize  one-twentieth  of  our  industries  at  the  expense  of 
nineteen-twentieths  ;  shout  “  protection  for  the  workingman,”  deducting  the  cost  of  the  noise  from 
his  wages  ;  then  cut  the  wages  down— first,  directly  in  cash  ;  next,  indirectly  by  competition,  in 
fostering,  with  all  our  might,  the  immigration  of  Huns,  second-hand  Romans,  and  cheap  anarch¬ 
ists,  from  all  the  sinks  of  the  earth.  If  this  handcuffing  of  commerce,  and  general  inversion  of 
values,  involves  a  loss  of  only  ten  dollars  a  year  to  each  person  in  the  country,  the  annual  sum  is 
five  hundred  and  fifty  millions. 

The  tariff  is  corrupt  taxation  behind  the  door.  The  direct,  uncovered 

Taxation  Monopoly 

is  next  in  order.  In  1850  the  wealth  of  the  United  States  was  a  little  more  than  seven  billions  of 
dollars.  It  was  assessed  for  a  little  more  than  six  billions,  or  six-sevenths  of  the  whole  value.  In 
1880  the  country’s  assets  had  reached  about  forty-four  billions.  The  assessment  was  for  about 
seventeen  billions,  or  somewhat  more  than  one-third  of  the  value.  Why  the  change  ?  It  was  to 
relieve  “  personal  property,”  and  thus  spare  the  rich  from  paying  their  proper  share  of  public  obli¬ 
gations,  which  they  put  on  the  comparatively  poor,  for  the  most  part  small  farmers  and  house¬ 
holders.  The  special  legislation  of  the  past  twenty  years,  exempting  bondholders  from  taxation, 
and  abetting  the  concealment  of  personal  property,  has  enabled  the  very  rich  to  shirk  about  nine- 
tenths  of  their  legitimate  tax-burdens,  f 

Our  fifth  national  confidence  game,  the 

Transportation  Monopoly, 

is  better  understood  than  the  other  four.  The  people  have  been  brought  into  closer  contact  with 
it.  Not  long  since  the  Harpers  published  a  rather  remarkable  book,  entitled  “  The  Railways  and 
the  Republic,”  written  by  Mr.  J.  F.  Hudson.  The  gentleman  puts  a  peculiar  conundrum  to  “intelli¬ 
gent  Americans.”  He  wants  to  know  whether  the  Republic  is  going  to  rule  the  railways,  or  the 


*  A  surplus  from  honest  taxation,  however,  is  just  the  right  thing,  and  the  reader  of  this  monograph  will 
ascertain  what  ought  to  be  done  with  it. 

+  “  The  greatest  evasion  of  tax-paying  is  among  the  richest  men — men  worth  ten,  twenty,  fifty,  or  a  hun¬ 
dred  millions,  who,  by  a  just  public  policy,  should  carry  taxation  at  a  quadruple  rate.  Sometimes  these  men  do 
not  pay  taxes  on  a  tenth  part  of  their  property.” — Hon.  W.  A.  Phillips,  in  “  Labor,  Land,  and  Law.”  Scribner’s 
Sons. 


REDUCED  TO  DOLLARS  AND  CENTS.  3 

railways  are  going  to  rule  the  Republic.  For  the  time  being,  the  answer  is  easy.  The  railways  do 
rule  the  Republic.* * * § 

How  wonderfully  these  steam  turnpikes  have  developed  our  resources  !  Their  great  managers 
have  even  “  made  something  out  of  nothing  ;  ”  for  they  have  saddled  on  us  a  fictitious  debt  of  four 
thousand  millions  of  dollars. f  A  double  interest,  one  half  illegitimate,  on  this  “  capital,”  our  railway 
bond-masters  are  whipping  out  of  the  toiler’s  sweat  and  the  merchant’s  alacrity. 

The  five  United  States  national  monopolies  that  I  have  now  designated  are  interlinked,  of 
course,  with  corporate  and  individual  monopolies  in  endless  variety.  Take  two  or  three  samples. 

By  a  vast  combination  between  the  Transportation  Monopoly  and  the  leading 

Coal-bed  Monopolists, 

competition  in  supplying  the  people’s  fuel — their  anthracite  and  bituminous  coal — has  been  extin¬ 
guished,  and  extortion  has  been  reduced  to  an  exact  science.  Every  ton  of  coal  that  now  reaches 
a  consumer  could  be  furnished  at  two-thirds  the  usual  price,  with  fair  pay  to  the  wretched  miners, 
and  a  handsome  profit  to  the  owners  and  carriers.  The  extra  percentage  is  piratical  spoil,  not  busi¬ 
ness  compensation.  The  coal-pool  buccaneers  levy  a  yearly  tribute  of  about  forty  millions  of  dol¬ 
lars  upon  a  patient,  ox-eyed  people,  who  really  own  the  coal,  and  grant  the  charters,  of  the  “  kings” 
and  “  barons”  who  ride  and  rob  tbem4 

The  Notorious  Standard  Oil  Company 

is  another  abomination  of  the  same  sort.  Its  record  has  been  summed  up  as  “  the  history  of  a  com¬ 
mercial  crime. ”§  Its  “  business”  has  been  simply  a  conspiracy  against  the  poor,  to  keep  cheap  light 
away  from  their  dark  and  desolate  homes.  As  Mr.  Hudson  says,  “  Its  vast  wealth  has  been  accu¬ 
mulated  in  less  than  fifteen  years,  by  speculative  manipulations,  by  bribing  legislators,  and  by  distort¬ 
ing  law  to  deny  to  one  man  the  privileges  given  to  another.”  This  conspiracy  began  in  a  deal  between 
the  Standard  “bosses”  and  the  “kings”  of  the  Pennsylvania,  Erie,  and  New  York  Central  rail- 
Toads.  The  purpose  was  to  kill  competition,  by  cornering  the  whole  product  of  the  American  peo¬ 
ple’s  natural  oil,  and  then  charging  us  double  price  for  it.  The  deal  has  been  a  monstrous  success, 
and  there  is  hardly  a  crime  on  the  calendar,  from  murder  and  arson  down  to  malicious  mis¬ 
chief,  that  has  not  been  perpetrated  in  carrying  out  the  plan.  But  the  Standard  Oil  Company, 
nevertheless,  has  piled  up  its  hundred  million  dollars  ;  the  railroad  pool  as  much  more,  probably  ; 
while  the  penalty  for  fleecing  the  people,  in  such  ways,  is  a  chair  for  the  oil-man,  Mr.  Whitney,  in 
President  Cleveland’s  Cabinet,  and  a  bench  for  the  railroad-man,  Mr.  Stanley  Matthews,  in  the 
Supreme  Court.  How  wisely  we  are  encouraged  to  respect  our  government  and  our  laws  1 

A  bare  index  of  monopolies,  about  as  bad,  if  not  quite  so  glaring,  as  the  coal  and  oil  conspir¬ 
acies,  would  be  too  long  and  exasperating  for  human  patience.  The 

Gas  Companies 

of  the  country  have  as  much  to  answer  for,  in  proportion  to  size  and  ability,  as  the  Standard  Oil 
Company.  But  nearly  our  whole  material  substance  has  been  monopolized  and  “cornered.”  As 
with  currency,  coal,  and  petroleum,  so  with  wheat,  beef,  corn,  pork,  and  the  rest.  Individual  and 
corporate  vampires  have  fastened  themselves  upon  all  the  great  products  and  commodities  of  the 
country,  and  these  are  only  permitted  to  reach  the  people  after  Robin  Hood,  Jack  Shepard  and  Dick 
Turpin  have  extracted  such  highwaymen’s  tolls  from  them  as  our  excessive  innocence  and  piety 
enable  us  to  bear  without  universal  insurrection. 

Our  revolutionary  father,  old  John  Adams,  said:  “Those  who  own  the  land  will  rule  the 
country.”  He  made  no  exception  of  his  own  country,  under  democratic  institutions.  And  he  knew 
what  he  was  talking  about,  though  he  stated  only  a  small  part  of  the  case.  Slavery  always  rests  on 
monopoly  of  ownership.  Turn  the  earth  over  to  one  man,  and  all  the  rest  of  mankind  would  be  his 
dependents — vassals  of  his  will,  beggars  for  his  crumbs,  if  only  the  poor  crumb  of  a  little  hard 
work  for  low  wages.  This  dependence,  this  beggary,  is  simply  the  latest  and  most  popular  condi¬ 
tion  of  human  bondage.  No  one  man  has  yet  squatted  on  the  whole  United  States,  and  fenced  the 


*  The  Inter-State  Commerce  Act  shows  some  spirit  of  rebellion  against  them,  and  appears  to  be  better  than 
nothing,  as  a  tendency  at  least. 

+  This  amount  is  taken  from  the  figures  of  B.  F.  Thurber  and  the  Anti-Monopoly  League.  Mr.  Hudson’s 
book  places  the  sum  a  little  lower,  and  the  author  of  ‘ k  Labor,  Land  and  Law  ”  puts  it  higher. 

X  According  to  the  report  of  the  committee  of  the  New  York  Legislature  in  1878,  it  would  seem  that  this 
statement  is  very  close  to  the  fact.  Mr.  Hudson  appears  to  sanction  an  estimate  of  thirty-one  millions.  If  the 
gentle  reader  is  not  satisfied  with  either  figure,  he  may  “  split  the  difference.” 

§  The  Railways  and  the  Republic  ;  page  67. 


4 


THE  PEOPLE’S  RIGHT  IN  WEALTH, 


country  in  as  his  private  property  ;  but  a  few  men  have  monopolized  pretty  nearly  all  our  natural 
wealth,  our  natural  opportunities,  and  the  capital  resulting  from  both. 

Ancient  Slavery 

conquered  men  in  battle,  and  then  held  them  to  service  with  chains  and  whips  ;  but  it  guaran¬ 
teed  them  a  living ,  if  only  in  the  interest  of  the  master. 

Modern  Slavery— 

the  white  American  slavery  of  to-day — has  conquered  the  people  by  taking  away  their  power  to 
earn  their  bread,  and  holds  them  to  service  by  a  general  combination  of  great  hucksters,  com¬ 
modities  at  law  called  attorneys,  and  the  dirtiest  breed  of  politicians  that  ever  tried  to  put  on  the 
airs  of  “statesmen.” 

We  are  tired  of  our  servitude.  Some  of  us  understand  it  thoroughly,  and  we  mean  that  all 
shall  understand  it  soon.  There  is  no  further  use  of  trying  to  deceive  us  through  political  wind¬ 
bags  and  journalistic  weather-cocks.  And  when  some  literary  shyster  of  the  great  monopolies — 
some  Edward  Atkinson— would  have  us  mouse  around  swill-barrels  and  ash-heaps,  to  live  on  what 
the  ignorant  rich  throw  away,  we  consider  him  and  his  figures  an  insult  added  to  injury.  We 
have  seen  “  the  signs  of  the  times,”  and  feel  what  is  coming.  It  is  economic  freedom,  economic 
justice.  There  are  two  means  to  that  end.  One  is  amelioration  for  the  masses — instant — beginning 
now  ;  the  other  is  revolution,  not  long  to  be  postponed. 

But  present  civilization,  bad  as  it  is,  embodies  the  best  hope,  the  truest  knowledge,  if  not  the 
happiest  condition,  that  humanity  has  reached.  What  we  have  gained  is  worth  saving,  especially 
what  we  have  gained  in  our  American  Republic.  We  cannot  afford  to  plunge  into  wreck  and  chaos, 
if  we  can  help  it.  And  there  is  not  the  slightest  need  of  the  pluDge,  if — well,  if  we  have  brains 
enough  to  see  and  do  the  right  thing. 

To  begin  with,  here  is  the  question  to  be  settled — the  bottom  of  it.  What  is  the 

Basic  Principle  of  Ownership, 

“  the  higher  law  of  property  ?”  What  is  the  natural  and  necessary  right  of  individuals  in  wealth  ; 
and  what  is  the  natural  and  necessary  right  of  the  people — all  mankind — in  their  general  heritage 
of  material  things  ?  As  strange  as  the  claim  may  appear  until  proved,  I  shall  show  that  this  prob¬ 
lem  has  been  solved, 


The  deepest  truth  of  political  economy  is  the  oldest.  When  the  great  Greek, 

Aristotle, 

founded  and  named  the  science,  he  saw,  at  the  first  glance  of  analysis,  that  all  property  rests  on 
natural  wealth — that  natural  wealth  is  the  source  and  raw  material  of  all  human  productions  and 
possessions.  In  designating  such  wealth,  he  summed  it  up  as 

“  The  Bounty  of  Nature.” 

What  Aristotle,  the  first  political  economist,  called  “  the  bounty  of  nature,”  Henry  George,  the 
best  known  of  the  latest  political  economists,  calls  “  land.” 

Now  the  bounty  of  nature — the  earth,  the  water,  the  air — was  not  made  by  any  man  or  stock 
company.  God*  made  it;  and  made  it  as  the  only  means  of  sustaining  his  creatures  made  with  it. 
So,  necessarily  and  self-evidently,  those  creatures  have  a  natural  right  in  that  gift.  Or,  as  Jeffer¬ 
son  said,  “the  earth  belongs  in  usufruct  to  the  living.” 

I  am  aware  that,  in  this  smart  age,  everything  is  denied  by  somebody. 

Natural  Rights  are  Denied 

— even  the  right  to  life.  But  life  is  here,  all  the  same,  and  nature  gives  it.  Has  the  receiver  no 
right  to  the  gift  ?  If  he  has  the  right,  it  comes  from  nature  with  the  gift— is  a  natural  right.  Man¬ 
kind  have  feet.  They  were  made  to  walk  on.  Hence,  men  and  women  have  a  natural  right  to 
walk  on  their  feet,  not  on  their  ears.  If  society — the  State,  the  government — should  cut  off  our 
feet,  and  try  to  make  us  walk  on  our  ears,  that  would  be  a  violation  of  a  natural  right— the  right  to 
walk  as  we  are  constructed  to  walk.  There  is  all  there  is  of  a  natural  right — the  right  to  act  in 
accordance  with  a  natural  fact,  a  natural  law.  The  business  of  the  State,  therefore,  is  simply  to 
recognize  and  maintain  natural  rights.  But  when  some  new  sage  tells  us  there  is  no  such  thing, 


*The  theological  designation  of  the  Absolute — of  “  That  Which  Is” — still  comes  to  the  point  in  the  shortest 
and  best  way. 


REDUCED  TO  DOLLARS  AND  CENTS. 


5 


let  us  waste  no  time  on  him.  Let  us  stop  talking  and  go  to  the  show.  The  gentleman’s  feet  are  in 
the  air.  He  is  walking  on  his  ears. 

No  :  the  great  doctrine  of  natural  rights — the  one  doctrine  which  fairly  comprises  our  Ameri¬ 
can  history— is  not  dead  yet,  but  has  just  begun  to  live  ;  and  the  one  natural  right  at  the  base  of 
all  other  natural  rights  is  the  right  of  human  beings  to  their  environment.  This  environment, 
made  with  them,  provided  for  them,  is  the  common  state,  and  so  es-tafce,  of  matter.  Thus,  not  by 
act  of  Congress  or  Parliament,  but  by  direct  act  of  the  universe  itself,  in  its  very  physical  as  well 
as  moral  constitution, 

Natural  Wealth  is  Common  Wealth. 

In  his  matchless  book,  “  Progress  and  Poverty,”  Henry  George  has  illustrated  and  elaborated 
this  natural  relation  of  man  to  matter — this  bottom  fact  of  political  economy — from  every  aspect. 
I  agree  fully  with  Mr.  George,  with  Mill,  Spencer,  and  the  rest  of  those  distinguished  thinkers,  in 
their  result.  And  here  let  me  deny  a  bit.  I  deny  it  is  merely  a  “  theory.”  It  is  a  discovery ,  a  law 
—as  much  so  as  the  law  of  gravitation.  It  is  the  first  section  of  the^ 

Higher  Law  of  Property. 

In  one  sense,  however,  and  a  very  prhctical  one,  there  is  no  dissent  from  it.  There  is  no 
theory,  no  form  of  government,  not  basing  its  reason  for  existence  on  the  claim  of  standing  for  the 
best  common  interests  of  the  people  governed.  And  there  is  no  theory,  no  system  of  political  econ¬ 
omy,  not  basing  the  tenures  to  property — the  laws,  the  practical  ethics  of  the  matter — on  the  same 
foundation,  the  best  common  interests  of  the  people  composing  a  state,  a  nation,  an  epoch. 
England  distinctly  asserts,  at  the  present  moment,  through  her  most  commonplace  and  conservative 
authorities,  that  her  whole  wealth  belongs  to  her  whole  people  ;  hence  her  right  to  call  on  every 
subject  to  defend  it.  She  merely  adds  that  the  methods  she  sanctions  and  enforces  for  the  distribu¬ 
tion  of  wealth  are  the  b^t  she  knows  for  the  general  welfare.  We  find  all  that,  now-a-days,  filtered 
down  into  so  ordinary  a  place  as  the  Cyclopedia  Britannica .*  But  is  not  this  conclusion  precisely  the 
same  thing  as  saying  that  the  people  of  the  world  jointly  own  the  world,  and  that  the  people  of 
any  country  jointly  own  that  country,  while  they  utilize  and  maintain  it.  We  come  right  back  to 
the  primary  cognition  that  the  right  to  live  implies  the  right  to  own. 

This  Basic  Principle  of  Ownership, 

too,  is  all  in  our  American  Declaration  of  Independence — and  is  there  in  the  very  best  way — as  we 
are  forced  to  see  the  moment  that  document  is  completely  analyzed. 

Our  fathers  declared  that  all  men  are  “  created  equal,”  and  are  “endowed  by  their  Creator 
with  certain  inalienable  rights,  among  which  are  life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness.”  But, 
as  human  life  is  absolutely  dependent  on  its  environment,  and,  as  there  can  be  no  liberty,  except  to 
die,  when  this  access  is  cut  off,  the  pursuit  of  happiness  must  necessarily  include  that  use  and 
enjoyment  of  things  implied  in  the  word  “  ownership.”  Hence  “  life,  liberty,”  and 

Property 

are  the  “  equal  rights  of  man,”  according  to  the  full  import  of  Thomas  Jefferson.  But  what  is 

Equality  ?  \ 

When  Jefferson  declared,  as  the  voice  of  the  modern  world,  that  “  all  men  are  created  equal,”  it 
was  not  with  the  meaning  that  every  man  and  woman  can  lift  just  five  hundred  pounds — the  inter¬ 
pretation  put  on  us  by  the  dyspeptic  stomach  of  Carlyle,  and  the  “  innocuous  desuetude”  of  the 
poet  Tennyson.  Washington  and  Franklin,  Jefferson  and  Paine,  were  too  busy  to  split  hairs  with 
sophists  and  pettifoggers.  All  men  stand  “  equal  ”  in  the  “  natural  rights  ”  of  “  life  and  liberty,” 
but  no  two  men  are  precisely  equal  in  the  capacity  to  improve  and  enjoy  those  endowments. 
That  is 

The  American  Tenet, 
as  every  intelligent  American  understands  it. 

Now  precisely  the  same  thing  is  true  of  man’s  natural  relation  to  property.  All  men  are 
“equal  ”  in  the  “  natural  right  ”  of  access  to  the  world’s  wealth — the  original  bounty  of  nature, 
and  the  improvements  that  mankind  as  a  whole  have  made  upon  their  inalienable,  indefeasible 
realty.  But  individual  men  can  employ  and  improve  that  wealth  only  in  accordance  with  indi- 

*  See,  for  instance,  the  article  on  “  Land.” 

+  Archbishop  Corrigan,  of  New  York,  somewhat  recently,  and  altogether  pertinently,  sought  the  answer 
to  this  question  in  his  fulmination  against  the  teachings  of  Henry  George.  If  his  Grace  desires  the  complete 
analysis  of  equality,  in  reference  to  political  economy  and  the  institutions  of  the  United  States,  I  must  be  par¬ 
doned  for  presenting  him  with  that  slight  token  of  my  esteem,  right  here. 


6 


THE  PEOPLE’S  RIGHT  IN  WEALTH, 

vidual  capacity .  In  the  distribution  of  wealth,  therefore,  under  the  natural  relation  of  manta 
matter,  all  men  are  not  unqualifiedly  entitled  to  an  equal  share  in  property,  but  to  an  equitable 
share ;  and  an  equitable  share  is  an  equal  share,  according  to  ability,  industry ,  and  economy .. 
There  is 

The  Higher  Law  of  Property 

in  full. 

Theoretically,  even  now,  it  is  pretty  well  recognized.  We  have  seen  how  it  lies  implicitly  in  our 
Declaration  of  Independence.  “Scientific  socialism,”  so  called,  re-declares  it,  in  demanding  all 
capital  for  the  commonwealth,  and  then  “  returns  according  to  deeds”  for  individuals.  Commun¬ 
ism— or  common  wealth  and  distribution  according  to  “needs” — comes  indirectly  to  the  same 
thing ;  for  the  one  need  of  needs  in  developing  this  earth  is  the  property-tools  to  do  it ;  and  it 
cannot  be  done  unless  these  tools  go  with  the  capacity  to  use  them. 

On  the  other  hand,  I  am  happy  to  see  that  our  hardest-headed  business  men  have  set  up  ther 
higher  law  of  property  as  their  special  creed.  In  a  controversy,  some  three  years  ago,  with  Mr^ 
John  Swinton 

Hon.  Chauncey  M.  Depew, 

as  the  exponent  of  Vanderbilt,  took  for  his  fundamental  postulate  the  assertion  that  all  men 
should  be  started  in  life  with  an  equal  chance  for  the  accumulation  of  wealth,  and  should  then 
be  permitted  to  enjoy  the  fruits  of  different  abilities  and  labors  unquestioned  and  unmolested. 
Again,  that  eminent  stock-philosopher, 


Mr.  Jay  Gould, 

has  expressed  the  same  sentiment.  He  did  so,  for  instance,  very  emphatically,  in  the  spring  of 
’86,  while  laying  down  the  requirements  of  integrity,  honor  and  justice,  to 

Mr.  Powderly,  of  the  Knights  of  Labor. 

So  the  Constitutional  fathers,  the  social  philosophers,  the  dreamers,  the  “  cranks,”  the  finan¬ 
ciers,  and  possibly  some  of  the  rascals,  stand  behind  me  for  authority.  It  is  hard  for  any  of  them 
not  to  accept  what  is  simply  the  Golden  Rule  carried  into  economics.  But  none  of  these  gentlemen 
know,  practically,  what  to  do  with  it.  Besides,  some  of  the  best  of  them,  in  their  way — like  Mr. 
Depew — entertain  the  great  truth  very  superficially,  and  don’t  really  wish  to  mean  too  much  of  what 
they  say.  And  they  have  no  conception  that  what  they  urge,  in  a  general  way,  as  a  handy  bit  of 
economic  piety,  speciously  advanced  by  the  rich  in  self-defense,  has  been  thought  out  into  a  complete 
and  connected  system. 

So  far  I  have  stated 

The  Logos  of  Ownership 

only  as  ethics.  But  nothing  is  more  simple  and  easy  than  to  convert  it  into  mathematics — after 
seeing  how. 

The  pivot  on  which  this  transformation  turns  is  fixed,  too,  in  nature.  It  is  the  fact  of  death. 

Fortunately,  men  cannot  take  this  world  with  them  into  the  next.  When  they  lie  down  in  the 
grave,  their  stocks  and  bonds,  their  money  and  mortgages,  go  to  other  persons.  The  entire  wealth 
of  mankind  reverts  from  one  generation  to  another 

Every  Fifty  Years, 
or  according  to  the  average  death-rate.* 

It  was  not  one  of  “  the  mistakes  of  Moses”  to  institute  his  “jubilee,”  with  the  general  re-dis¬ 
tribution  of  Hebrew  land,  on  the  basis  of  half  a  century.  That  grand  squaring  of  accounts,!  and 
redivision,  for  each  generation,  of  what  was  then  the  great  part  of  all  wealth,  shows  that  the  dura¬ 
tion  of  human  life  was  about  the  same,  four  thousand  years  ago,  as  we  find  it  on  our  tables  of  mor¬ 
tality  to-day.  By  their  “  jubilee,”  the  children  of  Israel  attempted  to  equalize  natural  wealth  among; 
all  the  people,  but  to  leave  the  products  of  labor  in  the  hands  that  sowed  and  reaped  them.  What 


*  “  The  average  death-rate  in  thirty-three  cities  of  the  United  States,  in  the  year  1879,  was  20^  in  one  thou¬ 
sand  ;  and,  in  the  year  1880,  it  was  22r20%  or  a  litttle  over  two  per  cent.” — Ownership  and  Sovereignty. 

According  to  the  latest  vital  statistics  of  Europe  and  America,  compiled  by  Dr.  J.  H.  Billings,  the  present 
death-rate  in  the  United  States  is  18  to  the  thousand,  annually.  In 


England  and  Wales .  20.5 

Sweden .  18.1 

Belgium .  22.4 

German  Empire .  26. 1 

Austria . 29.6 


+  Leviticus,  xxv.,  23-84. 


REDUCED  TO  DOLLARS  AND  CENTS.  7 

an  ancient,  barbarous  people  did  by  the  rule  of  thumb,  a  modern,  civilized  people  can  do  by  the 
rule  of  three. 

It  is  a  fact,  then,  and  a  fact  that  becomes  self-evident  as  soon  as  considered,  that  the  world’s 
wealth,  or  a  nation’s  wealth,  is  simply 

A  Reversion, 

extending  substantially  through  fifty  years.  But,  if  the  whole  wealth  of  every  generation  is  con¬ 
stantly  reverting  to  the  next,  on  the  average  of  fifty  years,  just  one-fiftieth  of  all  wealth  is  con¬ 
stantly  reverting  in  one  year.  This  one-fiftieth  is 

Two  Per  Cent. 

Is  it  not  perfectly  clear,  therefore,  that  an  annual  tax  of  two  per  cent,  on  the  full  value  of  ail 
property,  collected  by  society,  and  expended  for  the  common  good  of  society,  would  effect  com¬ 
plete 

Democracy  of  Ownership?— 

would  give,  with  each  and  every  year,  to  each  and  every  child  born  under  the  system,  an  equal 
share  in  all  the  opportunities  and  advantages  of  life  ? 

This  equation  has  been  denied,  so  far  as  I  know  to  date,  by  just  one  man  in  America — not  a 
mathematician,  but  an  editor.  I  am  looking  to  him  now  for  the  total  destruction  of  arithmetic. 

Mr.  David  Reeves  Smith,  who  appears  to  have  first  stated  the  basic  law  of  ownership  in  its 
exact  and  complete  proportions,  and  to  have  wrought  out  the  true  method  of  applying  it,*  has 
termed  this  application 

“The  Death-Rate  Tax 
and  the  revenue  from  it  he  has  termed 

“Natural  Rent.” 

It  is  a  perpetual  ground-rent  on  all  assets,  due  the  whole  people  as  a  common  fund,  for  the  pro¬ 
portional  use,  by  individuals,  of  the  general  heritage.  By  this  birthright,  death-rate  tax,  modern 
society  can  accomplish,  mathematically  and  definitely,  what  all  ancient  nations  accomplished 
approximately,  by  periodical  re-division  of  their  general  capital,  land — as  in  Judea  ;  or  by  govern, 
ment  holding  of  such  capital,  with  no  individual  tenures — as  in  Egypt,  f  For  such  were  the  two 
property  forms  of  primeval  civilization.  “Natural  Rent”  expresses,  annually,  constantly  and  per¬ 
petually,  the  exact  common  right  of  all  society  in  all  property.  It  would  equalize,  instantly,  con¬ 
stantly  and  forever,  not  human  wealth,  but  the  natural  opportunities  to  procure  it ;  instantly,  con¬ 
stantly  and  forever  leaving,  after  that,  every  individual  to  work  out  his  own  pecuniary  condition 
according  to  his  own  will  and  power. 

But 

What  is  to  be  Done 
with  the 
Common  Fund? 

How  is  it  to  be  expended  or  redistributed  for  the  common  good  ? 

Its  being  a  common  fund  implies  and  settles,  at  the  start,  that  it  is  not  to  be  directly  and  equally 
lumped  out  to  individuals,  that  idlers  and  spendthrifts  may  squander  it.  It  belongs  to  no  one  in 
that  way.  The  first  legitimate  use  of  any  common  public  fund  is  to  pay  government  expenses. 
The  next  use  of  it  is  to  secure  common  advantages  for  the  whole  people.  Suppose  the  property  of 
the  United  States  to-day  is 

50  Billions  of  Dollars. 

Then  the  people,  as  a  whole,  are  entitled  this  year  to  just 

1,000  Millions  of  It. 

This  is  the  amount  of  their  birthright,  death-rate  tax.  Figuring,  in  round  numbers,  the  expenses 
of  government,  national,  state  and  municipal — “  stealings”  not  included — may  be  set  down  at  500 
millions,  or  about  one  per  cent,  of  the  principal.  All  government  expenses  paid,  the  people,  there¬ 
fore,  at  this  hour,  are  entitled  to  the  remaining  one  per  cent — 

500  Millions  of  Dollars— 

for  redistribution.  This  redistribution  would  necessarily  take  the  form,  direct  or  indirect,  of 
furnishing  employment  to  citizens  without  capital,  at  the  highest  market  rates,  as  an  equivalent  for 

*  In  his  Ownership  and  Sovereignty :  An  Outline  of  the  True  Republic.  Claik  &  Foster:  Cohoes,  N.  Y . 
+  An  excellent,  accessible,  American  book,  full  of  facts  in  the  direction  here  summarized,  has  been  published 
during  the  past  year  by  Scribner’s  Sons,  under  the  title  of  Labor ,  Land  and  Law.  I  have  several  times  referred 
to  it.  The  author,  Hon.  Wm.  A.  Phillips — a  well-known  writer,  and  for  several  terms  a  prominent  member  of 
Congress— appears  to  have  devoted  the  best  part  of  his  life  to  this  work. 


8 


THE  PEOPLE’S  RIGHT  IN  WEALTH, 

the  just  monopoly  of  their  direct  equal  birthright  in  the  capital  of  their  generation.  For  property 
will  always  have  to  go  out  into  private  hands  unequally ,  that  those  best  able  to  increase  its  value — for 
the  community  as  well  as  for  themselves— can  take  as  much  as  they  can  make  the  most  of.  But 
the  distribution  of  the  death-rate  tax,  in  wages  for  work,  will  constantly  restore  the  equilibrium. 
And  it  will  make  no  difference  what  kind  of  work  is  done  by  those  employed,  so  it  pays  for  itself  in 
the  production  of  new  and  actual  wealth,  and  unloads  the  dice  now  played  in  the  “skin  game,” 
called  competition  !  While  society’s  common  capital  is  monopolized  by  the  few,  with  no  offset  for 
the  many,  there  is  no  such  thing  as  actual  competition.  The  word  is  a  lie. 

It  is,  of  course,  the  principle  of  redistribution,  and  the  direct  logical  application  of  it,  that  is 
here  stated,  rather  than  any  fixed,  invariable  method.  In  constantly  turning  over  to  the  people 
their  birthright  share  in  wealth,  it  would  not  be  necessary  for  the  government,  as  a  government, 
to  employ  a  single  man  otherwise  than  at  present,  unless  it  were  best  to  do  so  in  the  interest  of 
freedom  as  well  as  economics.  For  instance,  one  of  the  greatest  needs  of  the  American  people  to¬ 
day  is  to  live  in  comfortable  homes.  Suppose  the  people’s  fund,  above  government  expenses, 
should  be  expended  for  the  next  five  years  in  premiums  to  capitalists,  for  building  a  certain  style 
of  house  best  adapted  to  the  wants  of  the  average  family.  The  multiplication  of  such  houses  all 
over  the  land  would  in  itself  alone  employ  all  the  floating  labor  of  the  period,  at  the  same  time 
making  homes  plenty,  hence  cheap  and  easily  rented  or  purchased  at  their  proper  value.  If  two  or 
three  billions  of  dollars  were  thus  applied,  there  would  be  no  further  need  of  talking  about  an  “  un¬ 
earned  increment  ”  in  rent.  But  there  are  hundreds  of  ways  in  which  the  distribution  could  take 
place  without  the  least  tendency  to  injure  political  democracy,  or  to  erect  any  system  of  socialism. 
There  is  no  trouble  about  that,  except  in  the  heads,  or  rather  the  pockets,  of  our  new  slaveholders. 
Besides,  the  people  would  have  to  decide,  by  their  vote,  how  their  birthright-fund  should  be  used 
for  them. 

But  the  indirect  result  of  the  death-rate  tax  would  probably  be  greater  than  even  the  direct  result. 
How  many  millions  of  dollars — how  many  hundreds  of  millions— now  lie  in  the  safety -vaults  of 
New  York  and  Boston,  loafing  at  an  interest  of  two  to  four  per  cent.,  because  it  is  safer  for  money 
to  loaf  than  to  be  out  at  work.  Put  an  annual  tax  of  two  per  cent,  on  these  loafing  hoards,  and  see 
how  nimble  they  would  become,  in  order  to  save  themselves  !  They  would  rush  out  into  the  hands 
of  enterprise  and  labor  like  the  other  sort  of  loafer  to  a  free  tap.  They  would  weep  and  wail  for 
active  investment.  Never  again  would  work,  the  sire  of  wealth,  stand,  hat  in  hand,  begging  a  job 
of  his  own  offspring.  The  two  would  be  partners — would  have  to  be.  The  more  one  could  do  for 
the  other,  the  more  each  would  do  for  himself. 

Universal  Co-operation 

would  be  established  at  one  bound. 


My  claim  for  the  higher  law  of  property  is  now  evident,  I  presume,  in  its  full  scope.  It  gives  a 
centre,  a  head,  to  the  scattered  filaments  of  political  economy,  and  elevates  it  to  a  humane  and  co¬ 
herent  science.  The  law  establishes  the  most  definite  of  results.  It  points  out  exactly,  in  dollars 
and  cents,  to  the  people  of  any  country,  their  natural,  God-given  right  and  share  in  the  wealth  of 
that  country,  at  any  time  and  at  all  times,  with  the  way  to  get  it ;  and  this,  too,  without  disrupting 
society,  or  even  disturbing  its  time-honored  tenures  to  property.  To  my  mind,  such  a  law  is  worthy 
the  sword  of  Mohammed,  if  need  be,  yet  is  really  conservative,  and  only  formulates  for  actual  prac¬ 
tice  the  moral  basis  on  which  all  nations  rest  their  polity  and  their  right  to  govern. 

In  an  age  when  the  human  mind  prides  itself  on  being  a  scatter-brain  organ,  squatting  every¬ 
where  on  a  multitude  of  particulars,  and  then  crawling  to  their  focus  by  “  induction  ” — when  this 
game  of  snail-tag  is  alone  recognized  as  “  science” — it  is  almost  impossible  for  the  average  thinking 
creature— as  man  still  is  in  a  way— to  hold  himself  together  long  enough  to  receive  an  impress 
from  any  great  general  principle.  The  basic  law  of  ownership  simply  photographs  to  thought  a 
universal  relation  between  man  and  matter.  It  is  therefore  precisely  as  actual  as  man  and  matter 
themselves,  or  as  space  and  time,  though  even  the  so-called  “scientific”  may  easily  mistake  it 
for  a  personal  whim.* 

Moreover,  ’tis  the  logical  and  mathematical  end  of  Aristotle,  of  the  Gracchi,  of  Quesnay,  of  Her¬ 
bert  Spencer,  of  Henry  George.  Its  origin  reaches  back  thousands  of  years,  and  one  view  of  it  got 

*  A  while  ago  I  had  the  honor  of  reading  the  first  hasty  draft  of  this  paper  before  “  The  Institute  of  Social 
Science,”  in  New  York  City,  the  learned  and  distinguished  Mr.  Park  Godwin  presiding.  In  a  humorous  and 
genial  way,  he  was  inclined  to  class  the  higher  law  of  property  among  “  nostrums.”  But  presently  he  trotted 
out  a  nostrum  of  his  own— graduated  taxation,  or  rather  appropriation,  of  legacies— just  about  big  enough  to 
make  a  mouth  for  my  bottle.  So  I  lost  no  faith  in  Smith’s  economic  elixir. 


REDUCED  TO  DOLLARS  AND  CENTS. 


9 


nearly  seventy  thousand  votes,  the  other  day,  in  the  keen,  commercial  metropolis  of  the  United  States. 
For,  as  I  have  already  stated  and  demonstrated,  I  stand  on  precisely  the  same  principle,  the  same 
premise,  as  my  friend,  Henry  George,  though  I  am  forced  to  a  different  conclusion. 

When  Mr.  George  says  “land,”  he  explains  that  he  means  natural  wealth,  the  bounty  of  nature, 
or,  to  use  his  own  words,  “all  natural  forces  and  opportunities,”  the  “  whole  material  universe  out¬ 
side  of  man  himself.”  And  he  holds  that  this  “land ”  is  common  property,  to  which  every  human 
being  has  an  equal  right.  He  does  not  define  equality,  but  he  maintains  that  human  beings  are 
entitled  to  the  results  of  their  labor  in  accordance  with  what  they  do — that  these  results  of  labor  are 
strictly  private  property. 

All  this  is  certainly  true — even  self-evidently  true.  But  the  difficulty  with  Mr.  George  is  that 
his  method  and  end  are  not  the  logical  deduction  from  his  beginning.  His  finality  is  a  land  tax, 
bearing  all  public  burdens.  But  he  would  not  tax  land  as  he  defines  land.  If  “  land  ”  is  natural 
wealth — the  bounty  of  nature— the  whole  material  universe  outside  of  man  himself — then  Mr. 
George’s  land  tax,  which  is  only  a  ground  tax,  a  mine  tax,  and  the  like,  is  not  a  land  tax  at  all.  For 
his  “land” — natural  wealth— is  not  merely  to  be  found  in  farms  and  building  sites,  but  has  gone 
into  houses  and  ships,  and  everything  else,  as  the  raw  material  out  of  which  they  are  made.  Yet  all 
this  “  land,”  all  this  natural  wealth,  all  this  raw  material  worked  up  in  the  products  of  labor,  Mr. 
George  would  exempt  from  taxation.  He  would  not  tax  a  lump  of  gold,  because  labor  has 
picked  it  up  and  washed  it.  He  would  tax  the  hole  out  of  which  it  was  dug.* 

But  to  make  sure  that  we  do  no  injustice  to  so  great  and  true  a  man  as  Mr.  George,  let  us  take  his 
own  illustration — his  favorite  one.  He  would  not  tax  a  house  ;  he  would  tax  the  plot  under  it.  Why  ? 

Well,  land  is  given  to  all  men  equally,  and  the  usufruct  or  rent  of  it  should  be  used  for  their 
common  benefit.  This  is  the  main  reason.  But  he  comes  to  the  same  point  from  another  very 
significant  view.  The  piece  of  ground  had  no  value  at  the  start— say,  when  the  country  was  new, 
and  land  could  be  had  for  the  asking.  The  first  occupant  put  labor  on  it,  and  gave  it  utility— made 
it  supply  his  wants.  But  even  then  the  land  itself  had  no  value,  as  long  as  the  next  acres  had  no 
claimant.  The  land  got  its  value,  therefore — like  the  Astor  lands  of  our  American  Gotham— by  the 
general  coming  of  society  around  it,  creating  an  “  unearned  increment.” 

True.  But  the  house  also  got  its  value  in  precisely  the  same  way.  What  value  would  attach  to 
that,  without  this  same  presence  of  population— this  same  influx  of  society  in  general  ?  While  a 
house  stands  alone,  and  there  is  no  demand  for  it  except  in  the  uses  of  its  occupant,  it  has  no  more 
value  than  the  land  under  it.  But  as  soon  as  other  houses  are  built  up  around  it,  then  every  brick 
in  the  first — yes,  and  every  stroke  of  labor  that  went  to  make  the  brick  or  to  put  it  in  place — 
gathers  an  “  unearned  increment.”  Strictly  speaking,  there  is  no  such  thing  as  value  without 
society.  Value  is  never  intrinsic  and  independent,  but  always  presupposes  society,  if  only  two 
persons — one  who  has  something  the  other  wants.  Or,  in  the  familiar  terms  of  business  as  well  as 
political  economy,  “  the  value  of  anything  depends  on  supply  and  demand.”  If  we  are  to  insist, 
therefore,  in  Mr.  George’s  way,  on  the  common  right  to  unearned  increments,  then  a  house,  or  the 
very  coat  on  one’s  back,  is  common  property,  by  the  same  principle  as  a  piece  of  ground. 

But  we  have  seen  that,  according  to  Mr.  George’s  definition  of  land  as  “  nature’s  bounty,”  a 
house,  or  any  other  structure  of  human  handiwork,  is  land  itself,  as  far  as  original  materials  are 
concerned.  These  have  all  been  taken  off  the  earth  or  out  of  it.  They  are  component  parts  of  land, 
improved  by  labor.  Whether  timber,  stone  or  iron,  all  of  them  are  “  land  ”  in  their  basic  quality  of 
natural  wealth  as  the  common  gift  to  mankind. 

A  tree,  wild  in  the  forest,  is  certainly  a  piece  of  God’s  land-bounty — the  trunk  as  much  as  the 
roots  or  the  soil  around  them.  But  when  the  tree  has  been  hewn  by  labor  and  has  become  the  log  of 
a  cabin,  has  the  bounty  of  nature  all  gone  out  of  it  because  a  man  has  cut  it  down  and  fashioned  it 
over  ?  If  there  was  the  right  of  common  property  in  the  tree,  is  there  not  still  some  common  right 
of  property  in  the  log  ?  How  does  the  common  interest  all  depart  from  the  tree  now  that  labor  has 
appropriated  it  to  individual  use  ?  Can  the  bounty  of  nature  be  thus  purloined,  the  moment  it  is 
improved,  merely  because  labor  does  the  purloining  ?  Henry  George’s  land-tax  says  it  can. 

But  Let  Us  See. 

When  the  house-builder  has  cut  down  the  tree,  suppose  he  has  left  the  stump.  Then  the 

*  It  may  be  said  (by  some  innocent  lawyer,  perhaps)  that  a  great  many  words  have  more  than  one  definition, 
and  hence  Mr.  George  need  not  adhere  to  his  general  definition  of  land  when  he  comes  to  the  special  doctrine  of 
his  land  tax.  But  such  a  plea  would  be  mere  sophistry ;  for  the  only  right  and  reason  on  which  Mr.  George  rests 
his  Sole  land  tax  is  that  land  is  nature’s  common  gift  to  all  mankind.  But  if  he  taxes  laud  as  nature’s  gift, 
he  must  certainly  tax  the  whole  gift,  not  a  part  of  it,  if  he  is  to  assert  the  people’s  right  in  it,  and  if  he  is  to  be 
logical.  The  truth  is,  that  Mr.  George’s  use  of  the  word  “  land  ”  is  utterly  unscientific,  exceptional,  and  mislead¬ 
ing.  “  Land”  does  not  properly  mean  “  nature’s  bounty”  or  “  natural  wealth.”  The  word  is  not  big  enough  to 
cover  the  thing.  Mr.  George  uses  it  as  a  bright  soap-bubble.  He  blows  it  up,  for  generalization,  to  the  full  scope 
of  Aristotle’s  grand  phrase  :  then  deflates  it  for  taxation  to  its  natural  size.  After  a  while  a  bubble  so  blown 
must  burst. 


10  THE  PEOPLED  RIGHT  IN  WEALTH, 

farmer  comes  along.  He  digs  out  the  stump,  and  improves  the  ground  by  making  a  useful  excava¬ 
tion  in  it — for  a  cellar,  perhaps.  Now  what  better  right  has  the  house-builder  to  the  tree  he  has 
cut  than  the  farmer  to  the  land  he  has  excavated  ?  Both  the  log  and  the  cellar  are  the 

Improved  Bounty  of  Nature 

— the  two  ends  of  it.  If  so,  both  ends  should  be  taxed,  and  for  exactly  the  people’s  common  right 
in  them. 

In  1882,  according  to  the  tables  of  Mulhall,  the  property  of  the  United  States  stood  in 

Land . $10,750,000,000 

Houses .  13,900,000,000 

Railways . 5,450,000.000 

Cattle . 1,890,000,000 

Sundries .  9,205,000,000 

Total . $41,195,000,000 

So  our  land  value  is  this  country  is  not  much  more  than  one-quarter  of  all  values.  Yet  Mr. 
George  would  make  this  one-quarter  of  wealth  bear  all  the  public  burdens  of  the  other  three- 
quarters,  in  addition  to  its  own.  Every  practical  business  man  knows  instinctively  that  such  a  tax 
must  be  wrong ,  though  he  may  not  be  able  to  touch  bottom  in  his  objections.  The  fact  is,  it  would 
be  a  huge  monopoly  of  the  manufacturer  and  wage-worker  against  the  farmer. 

Still  Worse, 

it  would  not  take  out  of  individual  riches,  largely  heaped  up  in  mammoth  accumulations  of  per¬ 
sonal  property,  anything  like  the  people’s  share  in  them. 

No  :  society  has  a  common  interest,  not  only  in  the  ground,  but  in  all  property  whatever — for  the 
reason  that  all  property  is  either  the  raw  bounty  of  nature  or  that  same  bounty  of  nature  modified 
by  labor.  Individual  labor  can  get  no  title  to  common  property  by  merely  taking  it  and  improving  it. 

Moreover, 

If  natural  wealth  is  the  common  wealth  of  all  mankind,  it  belongs,  not  to  one  generation  but 
to  all  generations.  The  unborn  have  their  equal .  rights  reserved  in  it.  Hence  the  common  title  is 
inalienable  and  indefeasible.  No  part  of  the  general  heritage  can  rightfully  be  turned  over  to 
individuals  except  while  they  live.  Thus 

The  World’s  Wealth  Is  The  Common  Capital  of  Every  Generation. 

But,  on  the  other  hand,  it  is  just  as  clear  that  society  has  no  right  to  take  individual  improve¬ 
ments — the  products  of  any  man’s  labor — without  paying  the  full  value  for  them.  And  there  is  no 
need  of  taking  them  at  all ,  if  the  people’s  constant  right  in  wealth — their  usufruct,  or  rent — is 
annually  deducted  from  all  distributed  property.  In  that  case,  both  the  common  capital  and  the 
individual  improvements  on  it  can  remain  with  the  holders,  and  their  property  will  be  nothing 
more  nor  less  than  the  true  compensation  for  their  work  on  it. 

This  Inevitable  Sequence 

from  man’s  common  right  to  nature’s  bounty  is  of  such  striking  importance  that  I  must  be  par¬ 
doned  for  repeating  the  argument  in  the  form  of  an  almost  kindergarten  illustration. 

Society,  the  United  States,  say 

Mrs.  Columbia, 

says  to  Mr.  Toilson  :  “  Here  is  my  farm — my  lands,  forests,  mines  and  water- powers — my  whole  peo¬ 
ple’s  natural  wealth.  Take  a  piece  of  it— any  kind  you  like — as  big  as  you,  with  your  special  tastes 
and  talents,  can  make  the  most  of  ;  for  that  is  the  end,  they  say,  of  property — to  be  worked  up  to 
the  best  advantage. 

“Now  I  expect  you  to  have  your  living,  according  to  the  general  right  of  all  my  sons  and  daugh¬ 
ters.  out  of  that  segment  of  my  common  stock  and  your  work  on  it.  You  may  have  just  as  good  a 
living  as  justice  to  you  and  to  me  permits.  Consume  what  is  fair.  Go  to  Paris  and  London,  if  you 
can  brighten  your  brains  in  that  way,  and  be  of  better  service  to  your  pursuits.  Build  just  as  good  a 
house  as  your  special  organism  requires  for  the  best  results  to  both  of  us.  I  let  you  have  your  slice 
of  my  estate  for  that  purpose.  But  you  take  it,  you  know, 

To  Use  for  Life 

I  can’t  sell  it  to  you,  out  and  out ;  for  I  find  that  the  structure  of  the  universe  makes  such  a 
dicker  unconstitutional.  So  I  lease  you  an  outfit,  and  when  you  get  through  with  it  and  ‘  go  over 


REDUCED  TO  DOLLARS  AND  CENTS. 


11 


to  the  summer-land,’  I  will  take  my  pay  in  the  improvements  you  leave  on  the  original  realty.  In 
some  way,  it  appears,  I  must  distribute  all  such  values,  hereafter,  among  my  people— every  gener¬ 
ation  of  them — in  order  to  give  my  citizens  an  equal  start  in  life.  That  is  the  trend  of  democracy, 
as  things  look  now.  I  suppose  it  will  have  to  go  through,  in  spite  of  Bismarck,  and  Ouida,  and  His 
Honor  the  Mayor  of  New  York.” 

“Yes,  Mrs.  Columbia,”  replies  Mr.  Toilson,  “it  will  have  to  go  through,  as  sure  as  you  live. 
But  let  us  consider  your 

Business  Proposition. 

“  It  is  perfectly  fair,  provided  I  should  always  be  honest  and  faithful.  But  don’t  you  think  you 
leave  me  too  much  discretion  in  my  expenditures — my  consumption  ?  Then  why  should  your  other 
citizens  wait  till  I  am  dead  before  I  pay  back  anything  ?  Let  me  take  my  piece  of  your  common 
capital,  and  go  to  work  on  it.  I  shall  want  it  fifty  years — that  is,  for  my  life-time.  But  next  year, 
at  this  date,  let  me  drop  around  and  hand  you  currency  for  one-fiftieth  of  what  I  am  then  worth. 
Let  me  do  the  same  thing  every  year.  Then,  at  the  end  of  the  fifty  years,  instead  of  taking  away 
my  land  and  improvements — my  capital  and  additions — which  will  be  paid  for  in  full — let  the  hold¬ 
ing,  as  it  stands,  go  to  my  boys  and  girls,  under  the  same  condition  I  had  it. 

“  You  perceive,  Mr3.  Columbia,  that  the  whole  average  value  of  my  estate — all  the  property  I 
can  ever  hold — will  revert  to  you,  for  equal  distribution,  just  the  same  as  though  you  should  revoke 
all  wills  and  appropriate  all  legacies.  The  only  difference  will  be  that  you  will  give  my  heirs  the 
benefit  that  may  arise,  not  from  any  monopoly  of  your  capital  but  from  any  possible  superiority 
(beyond  the  average)  of  my  labor ;  while  I,  at  the  same  time,  shall  be  apt  to  be  much  more  economical 
than  in  other  circumstances.  If  I  don’t  really  need  to  go  to  Paris  and  London,  or  to  live  in  a 
palace,  you  will  not  be  charged  with  such  pretty  perquisites.” 

Mrs.  Columbia,  of  course, 
has  the  “last  word”  in  this  dialogue  : 

“  Friend  Toilson,  I  think  I  see  the  point.  You  would  utterly  abolish  all  my  present  hop-skip-and- 
jump  assessors,  from  one  end  of  the  land  to  the  other,  with  their  one-third  valuations  and  the  like, 
and  their  taxes  on  a  part  of  property.  You  would  have  one  tax,  and  only  one — a  strictly  ad  valorem 
tax  on  all  assets,  in  accordance  with  the  average  death-rate.  That  would  be  the  regular  charge 
against  every  body ,  for  holding  and  using  the  common  capital,  and  the  amount  would  always  be  in 
proportion  to  the  holding.  The  impost,  indeed,  might  be  called  an 

Equality  Tax  ; 

for  it  would  constantly  equalize  my  whole  common  wealth,  opportunities  and  advantages,  among 
all  my  citizens.  This  equality  tax  would  be  chiefly  paid  by  the  rich,  and  would  go  chiefly  to  the 
poor,  not  in  charity,  but  as  their  unqualified  right.  It  would  be  my  fund  to  guarantee  the  steady 
production  of  new  wealth,  and  to  compensate,  in  wages  for  honest  work,  the  non-capitalist  mem¬ 
bers  of  society,  for  any  monopolies  necessitated  against  them  by  the  difference  of  ability  among 
citizens  to  use  wealth  effectively.*  Deduct  this  constant  equality  tax  from  all  assets— thus  with¬ 
drawing  from  individuals,  in  proportion  to  their  wealth,  the  whole  average  interest  of  all  the  people 
in  all  property — then  the  assets  themselves,  however  distributed,  would  constantly  represent  the 
exact  value  of  the  natural  ability,  industry  and  economy  of  the  possessors.  In  other  words,  a  man’s 
property  would  then  stand  for  the  true  wages  of  his  labor,  paid  to  him  by  the  community, 

In  the  Shape  of  His  Property  Itself. 

“  The  arrangement  will  raise  a  dreary  howl  among  my  heavy  sharks  and  foxy  tax-dodgers.  They 
will  say  the  distribution  never  can  be  made — into  any  pockets  but  their  own — without  “  terrible 
corruption,”  and  “  danger  to  the  Republic.”  But  five  or  six  hundred  millions  a  year  ;  that  would 
be  the  surplus  for  redistribution  at  the  start.  It  is  only  twice  as  much  as  one  man,  my  enterprising 
Mr.  Vanderbilt,  left  behind  him  the  other  day.  If  my  boys  can’t  manage  to  distribute  that  sum 
faithfully — with  everybody’s  eye  and  vote  on  them  at  that — they  ought  to  be  turned  out  of  office, 
and  superseded  by  the  girls.  Toilson,  that  ‘  nostrum’  is  far-reaching.  I  will  take  a  bottle,  and 
renovate  my  system.” 

The  True  Principle  of  Ownership 

shows  how  unnecessary  would  be  a  revolution — especially  in  America — for  a  new  distribution  of 
wealth.  True,  we  have  no  end  of  thieves — individual  and  corporate — who  have  stolen  from  each 

*  This  monopoly — the  unequal  distribution  of  wealth  in  proportion  to  the  ability  “  to  work  it”— is  strictly 
just,  a^  the  most  “  solid”  lunkheads  in  the  world  claim  so  vigorously  ;  and  it  is  the  only  just  monopoly  that  can 
possibly  exist.  But  even  this  monopoly  would  not  be  just,  if  no  way  could  be  found  to  preserve  it  and  at  the 
same  time  to  counteract  it.  In  precisely  this  antithesis  (a  chip  of  Hegel  at  tne  bottom  of  political  economy)  lies 
the  guarantee  of  the  earth’s  pecuniary  development  in  the  largest  degree. 


12 


THE  PEOPLE’S  RIGHT  IN  WEALTH, 


other  in  such  a  way  that  only  death  and  sheol  can  balance  their  accounts.  But  as  far  as  rascals  go 
who  have  cheated  the  people ,  the  stolen  goods  are  just  as  valuable  to  tax  as  any  others.  And  the 
death-rate  tax  will  instantly  give  to  society  all  it  owns,  and  all  it  ought  to  have  in.  wealth,  to-day 
or  any  other  day,  however  that  wealth  may  happen  to  be  distributed. 

There  has  been  a  special  cry,  of  late,  against  land-monopoly.  It  has  been  greatly  needed. 
Anything  to  open  the  new  horizon  !  Anything  for  a  start  in  the  right  direction  !  But  the  confis¬ 
cation  of  rent,  or  the  nationalization  of  land,  directly  or  indirectly,  in  Ireland  or  anywhere  else,  is 
not  only  wrong  but  inadequate.  This,  it  seems  to  me,  I  have  demonstated. 

Again,  it  is  unwise  to  be  too  much  disturbed  by  the  present  concentration  of  wealth.  It  will 
simply  be  of  no  consequence  who  holds  property,  or  how  much  is  held  by  any  person  or  combina¬ 
tion,  as  soon  as  society  comprehends  and  adopts 

Scientific  Taxation. 

When  the  chief  end  of  a  State — next  to  yielding  prize  men  and  women — is  to  increase  the  pro¬ 
duction  of  wealth  in  the  interest  of  all,  without  halt  or  stoppage  ;  when  labor  is  guaranteed  to  the 
“  landless  ”  as  a  full  offset  for  capital ;  then  labor  will  be  just  as  good,  to  have  and  to  hold,  as  land, 
or  anything  else.  It  will  be  just  as  much  in  demand  as  any  other  natural  wealth  ;  for  labor  is, 
in  one  sense,  natural  wealth,  of  the  highest,  most  valuable  kind.  Now,  we  have  Lassalle’s  “  iron 
law  of  wages” — the  laborer  reduced  to  a  machine  costing  only  the  fuel  and  repairs  to  keep  him 
running.  But  throw  into  the  American  market,  directly  and  indirectly,  as  good,  at  the  start,  as  a 
thousand  millions  of  dollars  a  year,  an  increasing  amount  which  has  got  to  be  used  up  in  employing 
the  expropriated — and  which  can  be  thrown  against  any  unjust  monopoly  the  people  vote  to  kill — 
then  what  will  become  of  the  monopoly  and  “  the  iron  law  of  wages  ?”  History  is  a  junk-shop  full 
of  just  such  traps. 


I  have  devoted  the  first  part  of  this  monograph  to  showing  that  what  we  artlessly  call  “  civili¬ 
zation  ”  is  top-heavy  with  monopolies,  and  besotted  with  a  new  system  of  virtual  slavery.  But  now 
I  must  insist  that  no  one  of  our  great  monopolies — whether  land,  currency,  tariff,  or  transportation 
— is  much  worse  than  another,  and  that  all  can  be  extinguished  by  a  little 

Popular  Intelligence. 

Suppose  the  people’s  annual  rent  were  put  on  vacant  land — two  per  cent,  of  its  full  value,  say 
at  public  auction.  How  long  would  land  be  cornered,  and  held  on  speculation  ? 

Apply  the  death-rate  tax  to  banks — to  every  dollar  not  a  government  issue.  How  piously  the 
“  bullion  mongers,”  as  Thaddeus  Stevens  called  them,  would  invoke  the  shade  of  that  glorious 
greenback  saint,  to  forgive  their  sins  and  lead  them  to  salvation  ! 

The  tariff — well,  there  would  be  no  tariff  for  revenue.  The  people’s  annual  tax  would  furnish 
the  revenue,  as  direct  taxation  always  ought  to  have  furnished  it,  and  as  the  founders  of  our  govern¬ 
ment  would  have  provided  at  first,  if  they  had  not  been  obliged  to  compromise  with  any  number  of 
Beelzebubs  as  well  as  chattel  slavery.  Whatever  little  end  of  a  tariff  might  then  be  necessary,  it 
would  be  solely  for  protection.  The  protection,  too,  would  doubtless  be  real,  not  a  swindle. 

American  railway  stocks,  as  I  have  said,  contain  about  four  thousand  millions  of  dollars  in 
water.  A  good  deal  of  it  has  been  converted  by  the  growth  of  the  country  into  healthy  blood,  or 
fat.  But,  so  far  as  it  is  still  water,  the  death-rate  tax  would  instantly  let  out  that  dropsy.  The 
people,  too,  with  their  fund  in  hand,  could  build  a  few  railways  of  their  own,  if  desirable.  Yet  this 
very  fact  would  render  it  unnecessary — would  throw  the  old  roads  open  to  complete  and  impartial 
competition. 

Once  again,  there  would  be  no  occasion  to  talk  about  eight  hours  for  a  day’s  work,  with 
Strikes,  Black-Lists,  and  Boycotting. 

The  whole  business  of  society,  being  co-operative,  would  resolve  itself  into  the  production  of  just 
as  much  wealth  as  possible,  under  healthful  conditions  for  men,  women  and  children.  And  with  just 
distribution,  how  could  there  ever  be  any  overproduction  of  general  wealth  ?  President  Cleveland’s 
Mr.  Whitney,  and  his  confederates  of  the  Standard  Oil  Company,  have  a  hundred  millions  or  more, 
to  spend  on  cabinet  offices,  seats  in  the  Senate,  and  such  fancy  goods,  because  our  foolish  statutes 
permit  them  to  make  a  little  private  tub  of  all  God’s  kerosene,  and  so  fleece  his  whole  people  out  of 
five  or  ten  cents  a  gallon  on  it.  If  those  sleek  gentlemen  don’t  have  too  much  property  to  suit 
them,  under  such  a  deal  as  that,  is  there  any  danger  that  the  rest  of  us,  with  no  aces  and  jacks  up 


REDUCED  TO  DOLLARS  AND  CENTS. 


13 


our  sleeves,  will  ever  have  too  good  a  “  brown-stone  front,”  too  much  quail-onrtoast,  too  many 
diamond  ear-rings  and  seal-skin  sacques.  Overproduction  be - blessed  ! - prayerfully  ! 


It  is  said  that 

Socialism 

is  now  making  rapid  progress  both  in  Europe  and  America.  Very  likely.  Socialists  are  the  world’s 
new  enthusiasts.  Their  reform  is  a  religion  to  them.  And  they  are  not  dreamers.  They  have 
studied  their  epoch  and  know  how  sick  it  is.  They  think  they  have  found  the.only  cure.  When 
even  American  socialism  has  produced  a  book  like  Lawrence  Gronlund’s  “  Co-operative  Common¬ 
wealth,”  ’tis  time  to  look  around  for  arguments,  not  epithets,  with  which  to  meet  the  socialists. 
If  socialism  is  wrong,  let  us  confront  it  with  the  right  thing.  And  it  is  wrong.  Thomas  Jefferson 
still  stands  for  a  good  deal  more  wisdom  than  Karl  Marx,  though  Karl  Marx  may  be  a  good  tonic 
for  Jeffersonian  Democracy. 

In  spite  of  all  protests,  provisos  and  explanations,  it  can’t  be  dodged  that  socialism  demands 
substantial,  if  not  technical,  equality  of  wealth — premising,  as  it  does,  that  the  main  vocations  of 
life  are  about  equally  necessary,  and  should  be  about  equally  rewarded.  No  doubt  the  shoemaker 
is  quite  as  useful  as  the  doctor.  But  one  shoemaker  hitches  a  steam-engine  to  his  bench  ;  another 
works  with  a  broken  awl.  One  doctor  cures  you  ;  another  kills  you.  Should  they  all  have — not 
exactly  the  same  pay  ?  Socialism  does  not  say  that.  But  should  they  all  have  the  same  pay  in  pro¬ 
portion  to  the  time  and  labor  required  to  fit  shoemakers  and  doctors  for  their  work  ?  Socialism  does 
say  that.  In  the  next  breath  it  says:  “Results  according  to  deeds.”  But  it  can’t  get  results 
according  to  deeds  from  such  a  theory,  and  virtually  gives  up  the  attempt. 

The  reason  is  plain.  The  corner-stone  of  socialism  is  the  proposition  that  value  depends  on 
labor ,  and  that  average  common  labor  is  the  measure  of  all  value.  This  is  true  ;  but  the  inference 
from  it,  that  the  only  difference  in  the  value  of  labor  can  be  measured  by  the  difference  in  time 
required  to  fit  persons  for  one  or  another  kind  of  work,  is  not  only  not  logical  and  not  true,  but  is 
utter  nonsense.  How  much  extra  time,  devoted  to  the  average  human  creature,  will  measure  the 
value  of  Parepa’s  voice,  of  Angelo’s  conception  of  St.  Peter’s,  or  even  of  Worth’s  taste  in  fixing 
frills  on  a  pretty  woman  ?  Yet  all  these  little  coruscations  of  genius  and  dressmaking  are  a  part  of 
human  nature  and  of  human  wants.  They  have  value— ordinary  commercial  value  ;  for  human 
nature  must  be  taken  as  it  is,  not  as  some  professor  thinks  it  ought  to  be.  Socialism  simply  ignores 
about  half,  and  the  best  half,  of  human  labor — the  labor  of  taste,  of  genius,  of  all  natural  superi¬ 
ority.  It  levels  not  to  the  base  of  things  as  they  are,  but  below  the  base,  to  something  they  are  not. 
It  asserts  not  only  that  “all  men  are  created  equal” — in  natural  rights — but  that  all  men  are  born 
with  gifts,  so  nearly  equal  that  the  difference  in  both  the  gifts  and  their  results  is  merely  one  of  a 
little  time  and  training. 

Hence  the  deduction  of  socialism  that  society  can  establish  the  value  of  labor  by  fiat,  instead 
of  the  law  of  supply  and  demand.  For  the  plan  is  to  reorganize  society  by  a  government  grouping 
of  all  trades  and  vocations,  as  postal  work  is  now  grouped,  and  “  distributing  earnings  according  to 
deeds.”  But  who  is  to  decide  on  the  value  of  the  deeds?  WJy,  the  trades,  the  masses,  the  govern¬ 
ment,  the  State.  Thus  the  socialistic  scheme  contemplates  a  mononoly  of  the  dull  many  against  the 
inspired  few,  just  as  the  sharp,  artful  few  now  possess  all  sorts  of  monopolies  against  the  sluggish 
masses. 

Under  its  present  organization,  society  is  like  a  squint-eyed  sneak-thief,  who,  by  cunning 
legislation,  uses  taxation,  tariffs,  com-pot  currencies,  transportation  charters,  stock  corners,  grain 
corners,  hog  corners,  and  every  other  hidden,  cut-purse  implement,  to  pick  the  pocket  of  honest, 
stupid  industry.  Under  the  methods  of  socialism,  society  would  be  a  half-blind  house-breaker, 
with  a  dim  lantern,  boldly  helping  himself  to  unappreciated  and  inestimable  jewels,  and  throwing 
them  into  a  national  pawn-shop,  to  get  a  cheap-John  fiat  on  their  value. 

The  truth  is — the  root  of  it — there  are  two  kinds  of  nature’s  bounty.  One  is  the  earth  outside 
of  us  ;  the  other  is  the  quality,  the  capacity,  inside  of  us.  The  outside  bounty  of  nature  is  given  to 
mankind  in  common  and  equally.  The  inside  bounty  of  nature  is  given  to  individuals ,  separately 
and  unequally.  Now  I  insist  that  each  belongs  rigidly  to  whom  it  was  given ,  and  that  the  natural 
fruits  of  each  go  with  it. 

Nor  do  I  forgot  the  “  unearned  increments.”  Society  largely  makes  the  individual  what  he  is  ; 
and  the  moment  he  works  up  any  part  of  the  common  wealth,  and  population  spreads  the  use  of  it, 
tbat  moment  the  people  have  all  sorts  of  claims  against  him  for 

Unearned  Increments. 

But  these  all  go  over  into  the  wealth  he  accumulates,  and  the  death-rate  tax  will  take  them  all 
out  of  him,  all  the  time,  just  in  proportion  to  the  public  right  in  his  estate. 


THE  PEOPLE’S  RIGHT  IN  WEALTH. 


14 

Thus  the  collection  and  redistribution  of  a  people’s  natural  rent  will  do,  automatically ,  what 
socialism  would  try  to  do  by  arbitrary  fumbling,  and  by  loading  the  State  with  so  much  machinery 
that  it  would  be  like  odc  of  those  redressive  old  knights  of  the  middle  ages  who  couldn’t  get  up  or 
walk  in  his  armor.  * 

Comprehensively  viewed,  the  tenures  to  property  have  grown  up,  through  the  ages,  as  naturally 
as  accretions  of  coral.  They  represent  the  necessities,  the  common  sense,  and  the  common  con¬ 
sent  of  ages  and  nations.  And  the  most  of  these  institutions  are  in  themselves  right.  In  our  con¬ 
fusion,  we  don’t  yet  see  how  to  “  evolute,”  as  Mr.  George  Francis  Train  puts  it — how  to  bring  old 
substances  into  new  forms.  Private  ownership,  bequest  and  inheritance,  money,  rent,  interest,  are 
all  perfectly  well-founded  in  the  very  structural  relations  of  man  to  matter.  But 


Society  as  a  Whole 


is  always  the 


Sovereign  Landlord  and  Capitalist, 
and  owns  a  definite  share  of  all  wealth.  This  share  is  the 


People’s  Absolute  Right. 

I  have  pointed  to  the  fact  that  every  system  of  taxation,  now  existing,  implies  that  society 
owns  an  interest  in  private  property,  and  takes  such  property  to  pay  public  expenses.  It  takes,  also, 
the  Lives  of  its  citizens  to  protect  the  commonwealth.  But  the  principle  has  never  been  analyzed 
and  understood.  The  time  has  come  to  comprehend  and  apply  it. 


The  Masses  of  Mankind 

are  now  beginning  to  demand  comfort  for  themselves  and  opportunity  for  their  children,  as  the 
price  of  holding  communities  together  and  guarding  their  wealth.  But  the  masses  are  always 
honest  and  slow.  They  only  want  to  know  what  is  justly  due  them,  and  how  to  get  it  with  the 
least  trouble.  When  they  have  the  information,  their  vote  can  make  the  law  of  our  great 


and  their  example  the 


American  Republic, 
Laws  of  Nations. 


*  Of  all  the  wrong  things  now  before  the  world  as  economic  remedies,  the  best,  from  the  practical  stand¬ 
point,  is  the  “  limitation  of  wealth  ”  by  the  “  graduated  taxation.”  not  of  incomes  (the  worst  kind  of  a  tax),  but 
of  estates.  This  plan  appears  to  be  the  offspring  of  Mr.  John  H.  Keyser,  a  venerable  gentleman  of  very  large 
information  and  experience.  The  graduated  taxation  of  estates,  in  proportion  to  their  size,  if  carefully  estab¬ 
lished,  would  do,  approximately  and  by  guess-work,  what  the  death  rate  tax  would  do  by  exact  science.  But 
“  the  limitation  of  wealth  ”  is  not,  in  itself,  either  just  or  desirable.  The  thing  to  do  is  to  encourage  every  indi 
vidual  to  accumulate,  for  himself,  all  the  wealth  he  can,  at  the  same  time  taking  out  of  it,  for  society,  exactly 
what  belongs  to  society — the  correct  charge  against  every  individual  for  the  assistance  and  protection  which 
society  gives  him. 


;  ,  i 


*. 

. 


. 

v  •  . 

. 

' 


■ 


' 


' 


. 

.. 

' 

I  ■ 


ans- 
on  it  are 


Mr.  Clark’s  book,  “  Man’s  Birthright,  or  The  Higher  Law  of  Property  ”  (Putnam’s  Sons)  has 
elicited  wide  comment  borh  in  America  and  Europe.  The  substance  of  it  has  had  the  honor  of  {?; 
lation  in  France  by  M.  Godin,  and  has  been  reproduced  also  in  German.  A  few  comments 
subjoined  : 

No  one  can  deny  that  the  problem  which  Mr.  Clark  has  undertaken  to  solve  is  aae  deserving  of  the  most 
careful  consideration.  Every  day  affords  proof  of  the  existence  of  a  sentiment  that  4e  laws  which  govern  the 
creation  and  distribution  of  wealth  are  not  satisfactory.—  Boston  Herald.  v  f 

In  this  book  the  author  engages  with  spirit  and  clearness  in  a  discussion  of  the  question  of  property  His 
idea  is  a  modernizing,  by  the  taxation  method,  of  the  principle  of  the  Hebrew  Jubilee. — Galveston  News. 

Students  of  political  economy  will  find  this  essay  very  interesting.  It  is  written  with  conviction.—  New  York 

Times. 

His  exposition  should  be  read  by  every  student  of  those  “  burning  questions”  which  are  now  engaging  the 
attention  of  the  great  economists.— The  Current  {Chicago). 


Mr.  Clark’s  book  is  a  most  important  contribution  towards  a  solution  of  the  grave  social  questions  that  are 
calling  loudly  for  settlement  in  England  to-day,  and  must  soon  have  a  general  bearing  in  this  country.— New 

York  News. 


A  remarkable  little  book  has  just  been  written  by  Mr.  Edward  Gordon  Clark,  which  is  one  of  the  most 
interesting  and  novel  contributions  to  economic  literature  that  has  appeared  in  this  country. — Albany  Evening 
Journal. 


In  regard  to  style-the  packing  and  pointing  of  pure  English-Mr.  Clark  was  long  ago  pronounced  a  mas¬ 
ter  by  the  giant-master,  Wendell  Phillips.  “Such  a  weapon  as  this  finished,  full,  terse,  admirable  style,  so 
winning  one  cannot  stop  reading,  no  matter  what  the  subject !  I  envy  you  !  ”  Those  are  the  words  addressed 
by  Wendell  Phillips  to  the  author  of  “  Man’s  Birthright. "—John  Swintoris  Paper. 

Mr.  Clark  writes  apparently  with  the  greatest  confidence  that  he  has  found  a  solution  of  the  problem  of  the 

regulation  and  distribution  of  wealth,  and  without  doubt  there  is  force  in  his  main  propositions. _ 1  he  Index 

{Boston). 

I  am  glad  your  book  is  coming,  and  wish  it  every  success.  If  in  anything  you  can  show  that  I  am  in  error 
I  will  accept  the  amendment. — Henry  George. 

Mr.  Clark  certainly  manages  to  show  pretty  well  on  what  a  brittle  staff  of  argument  Henry  George  leans.— 

New  York  Times. 

In  the  progress  of  the  argument  to  sustain  the  position  taken  by  “  Man’s  Birthright,”  the  reasoning  of  Mr. 
George’s  famous  book  is  severely  criticised,  and  in  some  instances— material  ones,  too— overturned.  To  those 
who  are  in  accord  with  Mr.  George’s  premises  and  at  variance  with  the  outcome  of  his  work,  “  Man’s  Birth¬ 
right”  furnishes  tenable  ground  to  stand  on— Justice  [organ  of  the  Anti  Monopolists,  New  York). 

t  We  believe  that  Henry  George’s  theory  is  bad,  and  we  thank  the  author  of  “  xvlan’s  Birthright  ”  for  declaring 
it  “  simply  a  vast  monopoly  of  the  manufacturer  and  the  wage-worker  against  the  farmer.”—  Winsted  {Conn.) 

Press. 

Several  years  ago  I  read  Henry  George’s  book,  and  it  came  to  me  like  a  revelation.  Its  merit  is  in  setting 
forth  the  social  problem  so  as  to  be  understood.  I  have  felt  that  his  remedy  was  defective,  inadequate,  and 
impracticable.  I  was  thus  prepared  to  appreciate  your  book,  and  I  have  been  intensely  interested  in  it.  I 
believe  your  principle  is  the  true  one.—  Rev.  Dr.  K.  C.  Anderson. 

The  book  impresses  me  very  strongly.  It  seems  to  me  that  it  is  the  word  that  was  needed  to  be  said  to  clear 
the  perplexity  and  obscurity  of  this  subject.  It  seems  to  move  of  itself,  like  a  proposition  in  Euclid. — Rev.  R. 
Heber  Newton. 

Mr.  Clark  has  attempted,  in  “Man’s  Birthright,”  to  solve  the  problem  of  a  more  equitable  distribution  of 
property  than  now  prevails.  He  describes  with  great  force  and  eloquence  the  injustice  of  the  present  system. 
He  is  quite  as  brilliant  and  vigorous  as  Henry  George,  but  his  solution  of  the  problem  is  different.  While  he 
does  not  believe  that  any  one  has  a  right  to  monopolize  the  forces  of  nature,  he  does  not  advocate  land  nationali¬ 
zation.  While  he  believes  that  every  one  has  a  right  to  all  land,  he  is  not  in  favor  of  its  acquisition  by  the  gov¬ 
ernment.  He  does  not  assail  vested  rights  or  preach  communism.  He  would  simply  subject  all  property  to  what 
he  calls  a  ground-rent,  representing  the  claim  that  a  generation  has  to  all  existing  property. — Rochester  Demo¬ 
crat  and  Chronicle. 

The  death-rate  theoi  y  of  taxation  seems  to  be  the  only  one  that  can  satisfactorily  solve  the  problems  of 
political  economy;  and  notwithstanding  the  array  of  illustrious  names  which  have  contributed  to  that  science, 
we  apprehend  that  none  of  their  discoveries  will  ever  rank  in  importance  with  the  revelation  afforded  by  this 
vigorous,  lucid  and  concise  statement  of  The  Higher  Law  of  Property. — Troy  Evening  Standard. 


